Project Measures Health of Polar Regions

More than 50,000 scientists from 63 nations begin turning their attention to the world's poles this week to measure the effects of climage change, using ice breakers, satellites and submarines to study everything from the effect of solar radiation on the polar atmosphere to the exotic marine life swimming beneath the Antarctic ice.  Sponsored by the United Nations' World Meteorological Organization and the International Council for Science, International Polar Year unifies 228 research projects under a single umbrella, with the aim of monitoring the health of the Earth's polar regions.  The project officially begins Thursday and ends in March of 2009.

(from Cathie Vonesh, 2/27/07)